Beautiful song by France Gall, released only on a Canadian EP (if I’m correct). Merci Natasha for the link.
France Gall – L’hiver est mort
France Gall
France Gall – L’hiver est mort
France Gall – L’hiver est mort
Hot Hausfrau Entertainment
Once the famous Blue Note label was home of Miles Davis, Ornette Coleman, or Thelonius Monk. Nowadays, its catalogue features jazz artist impersonators like German so-called entertainer Götz Alsmann. On his new album In Paris, he covers songs by Trenet, Aznavour, Montand, and others, in some rather remarkable style: The band, featuring an extraordinarily obtrusive vibraphonist, swings like a red hot hausfrau changing a vacuum cleaner bag, while Alsmann himself buoyantly chuckles and chortles, guffaws and giggles his way through the chansons, his personal highlight possibly being his version of Serge’s early tongue-in-cheek ditty Cha Cha Cha du Loup – now sounding like Chester the Molester on the loose at some German primary school.
Götz Alsmann – Der Wolf tanzt Cha-Cha-Cha
Je t’aime
Longtime FOFS (Friend of Filles Sourires) Roger Grund send me a rework of the ole’ Je t’aime…moi non plus, mixed with some klezmer-clarinet. It could be the basis of a ‘sick love song’, as Roger puts it. ‘I will consider to add any vocalist’, he adds. And: ‘Particle was compiled in search of the definitive rhythm guitar and is dedicated to the magik of Arthur Greenslade, Serge Gainsbourg, Michel Houellebecq and the now stagnant Circus Contraption.’
So there. Work in progress. Let’s see what happens next.
Roger Grund – Particle
Illustration stolen from HERE
Charlotte Gainsbourg
Call it a collection of leftovers, a cash-in for Christmas, fact of the matter is that Charlotte’s bric-a-brac of live-tracks and inédits makes a bigger impression than Lulu Gainsbourgs covers of their dad’s work. Sure, there are flaws. None of Serge’s songs among the live-tracks, I’d have loved her version of Hôtel Particulier, which she played on the tour. Charlotte is a limited singer, and at times has trouble getting heard over the loud band. But her version of Dylan’s Just Like a Woman is great, and so is In the End. We’ve heard a lot of the studio-songs already, the astounding White Telephone, the clunky Terrible Angels and Memoir, written with Conor from Villagers. Paradisco is in the vein of Beck’s more danceable tracks, All the Rain sounds like a demo of Trick Pony and Out of Touch (with Noah & the Whale) is pure fragile gold. Stand out track is Anna, with it’s ploppin’ bass and the Je suis venue te dire-like melody you can tell the title isn’t just a reference to the movie with Serge. Left overs usually don’t taste this good.
Coeur de Pirate, AB Bruxelles, 12/4/11
We were there. Oh, how we were there.
We (me, FransS, Maks), we were exchanging profanities. Glances. Smiles. We were there when Béatrice Martin of Montréal Canada, smiled her million dollar smile. When she and her band (four guys who looked like French nephews of the Followill-family) r-o-c-k-e-d the Bruxelles AB venue. The first two songs, Verseau and Adieu, kicked serious ass. Bé’s voice was strong, confident, on top of things. We Dutchies, we had to adjust. We knew she could sing, but we only saw her play the grand piano, on several live-in-the-studio-clips. Here, in the big red box of the AB, we saw a bandleader.
Who was moved to tears, a few times. That, or La Martin needs to get an Oscar for “Most convincing watery eyes while doing a concert”. Was it because the audience (beautiful girls in dresses, parents, kids, rockers, us) were singing along to her lyrics, to songs like Francis and Comme des Enfants? Could be. These songs, from her début, were written when she wasn’t as confident as she looked. When we was a teen, struggling with her emotions, trying to find the right words. Is what I’m guessing.
The genuine emotions of Béatrice, who smiled and laughed and joked a lot during the concert, were icing on a sweet, sticky musical cake. When she took it down a few notches, playing Cap Diamant from Blonde, inédit La Reine or (big surprise) Bedouin Soundclash’s Brutal Hearts, one could not help falling in love with her charm, her voice and the sheer quality of these songs. Halfway I could hear a booming American dj-voice in my head going ‘And the hits just keep on a-coming’: Place de la République, Les Amours Dévouées, Le Long du Large, the singalong Pour un infidèle…what an amazing body of work, already. There were nice surprises (one of the French Followills changed from guitar to violin, his bass-playing cousin sometimes used a bow on his upright bass), but playing Adieu twice (second, and last song before the encore) and Comme des Enfants twice (as the very last song) annoyed me a little. Why no covers? I would’ve loved her version of, say, Lana del Rey’s Video Games. Or another Rihanna-take. Something. Anything.
But we were there. We were in the moment, like the rest of audience, like B. and her band. See for yourself.
(Picture was taken at the Bruxelles-show by @kmeron)
PP Haine
France de Griessen recorded this grand cover of Les Sales Majestés anti-Santa song especially for this blog (remember?). Now she made a video. FS <3 FdG.
Clip PP Haine door natydred
Year lists (2)
Sami, of the Hot Fidelité blog and a FOFS for a long time, lines up his fave French tracks of the year:
1. La Femme – Sur la planche. This unsigned Biarritz band have only released two ep’s and already an instant hit. Sur la planche sounds like the best french surf song ever, somewhere between Rock lobster and L’aventurier.2. Brigitte – Battez-vous. They ask men to fight to get them but each time I hear this perfect combination of bassline, handclaps and punchlines, there’s a riot goin on.
3. Nous Non Plus – Bunga Bunga. Easily the kinkiest song of 2011, and probably the best anthem for the end of the Berlusconi-era.
4. Jenifer – Je danse. Highly guilty pleasure, this popstar never really convinced me before this funky track, very 80’s inspired.
5. Mighty Mocambos & Caroline Lacaze – Physique. One of the very few examples of enjoyable and soulful funk sung in French.
6. Lescop – La forêt. Hated his band Asyl but surprised by this new wave return, kind of Taxi Girl 2.0
7. Yelle – Que veux tu. Cheap synths, childish lyrics but it works again for Julie and her boys.
8. Julien Doré – Kiss me forever. Reminds me of Coffee & TV, hard to get out of your head when you hear it.
9. Orelsan – 1990. A kinda old school rap song about what was acceptable in the 90’s, catchy and fun.
10. Katerine, Francis et ses peintres – Roc. Every cover he made on his triple (!) LP is great, but this one is waaaay to hilarious.
New Eléphant video
New EP is released in January. This video is an update of this video.
Year lists (1)
Time to round things up, the best and worst songs, shows and albums of the year. The staff of Filles Sourires (Sky, FransS, Maks, me) will post their personal lists in the upcoming days. I’ve asked several guest-contributors and Friends of FS (FOFS) to compile a year list too. One of the FOFS e-mailed me that he was quite disappointed of 2011, French music-wise. And I have to agree. When I go through older posts, it seems like we’ve been posting almost exclusively about Coeur de Pirate, the Gainsbourg family and Benjamin Biolay. Ahem.
That said, I did hear some exciting, fresh and sultry sounds. Here goes:
Albums (Female only):
1. Coeur de Pirate – Blonde. This blog was there every step of the way, it seems. In summer it was Armistice, the mariachirock-project of Bé and Jay. Then came the long (well, several months) wait for what promised to be the bestest French album of the year. La Martin did not disappoint. Blonde is a retrofied, country-and-mariachi’d string-fest. Killer songs, killer production, killer lyrics. On December 4, me and FransS will attend the celebration of CdP’s magnificent talent, when she will KILL the Brussels AB-concert hall. No prisoners!!
2. Brigitte – Et vous, tu m’aimes? Ever since I heard the beatific Battez-vous, I fell in love with quirky Aurélie and Mayane. Their first album is full of sexy odball songs, some in English, most in French. Catchy, weird-but-good, I wonder what they’re going to do next.
3. Charlotte Gainsbourg – Stage Whispers. This will come out next week, I got a promo and I got hooked. It’s a bits’n pieces-album, with leftovers, livetracks and new(-ish) songs. Charlotte’s leftovers are more exciting then the coverversions of Serge’s songs by half-brother Lulu. Listen to Paradisco for instance.
4. Austine – Le calendrier. I didn’t play this as much as I should’ve, for it’s everything this blog stands for: Lolita-voiced, gorgeous girl sings intimate, piano-driven songs about love and life. Austine needs more attention.
5. Salomé Leclerc – Sous les arbres. Honestly, I think Les Quebecoises made a bigger impression on me as an avid listener of French music than their French counterparts. Coeur de Pirate is hors categorie, this melancholy babe is destined for great things. Her album isn’t a five-star affair like CdP’s first big bang, but I songs like Volcan and Partir Ensemble take my breath away. Also from Quebec, also impressive this year: Chloe Lacasse, Catherine Major, Caracol.
(Close, but no cigar: Mélanie Laurent, Claire Keim, Elsa Kopf, Poney Express, Camille, Yelle, Claire Denamur)
Reissues:
There can be only one. Sure, the dvd in the magnificent Histoire de Melody Nelson box lacks the clips, but they’re all on Youtube and on earlier SG-dvds. What counts is the fantastic booklet, the documentary, the outtakes. Worth the wait, worth the dough.
Songs ‘n singles (male and female)
Albums by French singing guys that impressed me? Err…there was Thomas Fersen’s Je suis au paradis, Thomas Dutronc’s Silence on tourne, and then my mind goes blank. A few songs ‘n singles did make a lasting impression:
1. Thomas Marfisi – Les filles commes toi. Britpop, French-style. Very catchy. Looking forward to that album
2. M & Vanessa Paradis – La seine. Didn’t see the film, but this track of animated movie Un monstre a Paris is as good as earlier teamups of M and Nessa.
3. Keren Ann – Je fume pour oublier que je bois. Bestest track on the Alain Bashung tribute Tels Alain Bashung. Keren was involved with several projects this year. And then there was her own album, which failed to impress me. But this danceable cover is very noteworthy.
4. Mighty Mocambos & Caroline Lacaze – Physique. Funkiest funk I heard all year.
5. Benjamin Biolay & Chiara Mastroianni (aka HOME) – D’un rive à l’autre. A LOT of tributes were released last year, the one for Jacno was by far the most interesting one. This duet, between former lovers Ben and Chiara, was one of the highlights.
6. Nicolas Comment – Nous étions Dieu. Gainsbourg, produced by Martin Hannett, I wrote in January. Heavy bass, booming voice, great hook.
7. Philémon Chante – J’arrive toujours un peu trop tard. Canadian singer goes to Cuba to record his ironic, yet compelling songs, with a Cuban accent. Nice.
8. Charles Aznavour – Va. From his most recent, and hopefully his last album. The voice is gone, the starpower is still there. Toujours doesn’t sound like an epitaph, more like a celebration. Take a bow.
9. Lescop – La Foret. I know very little about this guy. I do recognise a brilliant track when I hear one.
10. Miles Kane – The Responsible. Not French, but a cover of a classic Dutronc-track, well done by a Britrocker who’s a big fan of French 60s pop.